I love the idea of a movie hero in a thriller who is able to get ahead by just his brilliance, and not with a gun or by being an action hero.

Idealism loses to pragmatism when it comes to winning elections.

I don't think there is anything more bitter in American politics than a close election.

I don't use my writing career as a vehicle to get me acting work or to write roles for myself.

I have absolutely no musical talent of my own!

I really want my career to be as an actor-writer-director-producer, you know? I don't know what will be stronger than the other.

I studied voice for about two years with an amazing coach, and I never rose above the level of mediocre.

I think I've had my fill of electoral law.

I think there are a lot more writers who are actors than you know; they just don't have roles on famous TV shows that you recognize.

I took a lot of writing courses.

I was a volleyball player as a kid. I played volleyball all the time.

I was alone a lot as a kid, because my parents were divorced.

I wouldn't say I'm a political junkie. I follow it. I read a few articles every day.

My goal isn't so much genre, or fact-based or not fact-based. I just want to work on projects that I think could be great.

The auditioning process is one in which the actor gets very little information about almost every element of it.

Even from a really young age I was a huge movie buff - five, six, seven, eight. Just loved movies, but in a more in-depth way than most kids that loved movies at that time. I'd find a filmmaker or something and want to see all his movies.

I spent so many years of my life as a stage actor and when you do all these plays, a lot of really great plays are very politically driven. They deal with deep social issues, and that's the kind of stuff that I love, as an audience member.

I think most of America is seeing the strings behind the campaign, and sees the crass political maneuvers that people are making. I mean, they're extremely apparent to me.

I've found that sitting around and obsessing about projects moving forward, when there's actually nothing I can do about it, at a certain point, is really counter-productive.

My strangest auditioning experience was when I was reading for a TV show, and right when I started the audition, the casting director left the room and yelled at me from the hallway to keep reading.